how much is it to start wholesaling for a newbe ?thank you frank B
Some people say $2000. If you are new it might be best to hire a mentor to lead you through the first deal.
When I got started I had $42.00 and a pager… Its not how much it cost’s to get started the problem is that you can’t put a price tag on Motivation!
It take money to be Motivation. Motivation is driven by money.
I agree with figureditout. The number one thing you need is motivation, not a mentor. A mentor can be a great resource, but just that a resource. It is up to you to make things happen.
I recently got started in wholesaling. I researched like crazy until I had learned enough to understand the process and what was needed to do my first deal (and that process took about 2 weeks, not 2 months, not 2 years, I am not endorsing paralysis of analysis). Then I started marketing for motivated sellers, building my buyers list, I got my contracts together. Then when I got my first house under contract, I got is wholesaled in 10 days, closed in 2 weeks and made $6000.
After that I mailed for another 3 months without any deals. It was very depressing and frustrating, because I knew I was doing everything right, but I was not getting any deals. But I kept at it, did not give up, and then in 1 weekend I got 2 deals. One of those deals will close tomorrow, the other is getting the title cleared, and today I got another house under contract (deal #4).
And there is no secret formula to doing it, just develop a decent plan of action and implement it consistently and persistently.
As for the budget, rather than ask how much do you need to get started, look at what resources you have available and ask how can I use these resources to do what I want to do.
kelle711,
I look at your website and I was surprise to see that you do not list a phone number or your location where you buy or sell and just wonder are there a reason your domain is behind a domain of proxy. kelle711 no bashing just wandering.
Thanks for checking out my website. I always appreciate any feedback I can get. It says on the form that I buy houses in the Washington DC area, plus I use Google Adwords to drive traffic to my site and I use their geographic limiting feature to focus on just people in my area.
I don’t have my phone number on there because I want people to fill out the form. I have only been doing this for 6 months and I still have a very demanding 9 to 5, plus I am a wife and mother of 2 (my boys are 7 and 3), so I don’t have time to field a lot of calls. Plus at this point, my main method of finding motivated sellers is direct mail, so I reserve my phone number for those calls (which is plenty since I mail between 200 and 300 letters every week and I average a 6% response rate).
Once I have some money saved up and I can quit the J.O.B, I plan to launch a comprehensive marketing assault on D.C, VA, and Maryland, and to absolutely dominate the DMV. But that would take some infrastructure, and infrasturcture takes money, plus you have to crawl before you can walk. So I am pacing myself until the time is right, and that is why I do not have my phone number on the website.
But don’t worry, I am not doing too badly. My second deal just closed today and I am expecting a nice check in the mail. Plus deal #3 is working its way towards closing (it has many title issues but I am not walking away, I am working through them), and I just got a contract for deal #4 yesterday. I have a homeowner that said he would email me the signed contract tonight but I am not going to count that as a deal until I get it. Acutally he contacted me through my website :biggrin.
$0.00 Love, passion, enthusiasm, confidence, focus, discipline, persistence, patience, and consistency.
kelle711,
You are an inspiration to me ! I am new to wholesaling and was thinking that I would need to have a mentor to walk me through my first few deals (I am working on deal #1) …but as you said motivation is key. One question are you working with a real estate agent ? Some of the information I have read says to work with a “investor friendly” agent to help you locate deals ?
elijahgrey99,
Thank you for the kind words. Motivation is indeed key but to be successful, you still need to know what you are doing. When I said I did a lot of research, I mean I did a LOT of research. And while I did not have a mentor, I asked lots of questions and learned from every investor I met. I tried to give myself the kind of thorough understanding that a mentor would give a mentee. I could not afford a mentor and I was determined not to let that be a barrier to getting started. However, I realized how important it was to properly educate myself, develop a solid plan of action, and to pace myself as I implemented, leaving room to learn and improve.
I work with a real estate agent, but mostly to get comps, rather than find deals. I find my motivated sellers through direct mail to absentee owners. I like to bring deals to my buyers that they cannot find anywhere else. I looked at the dynamics of my local market, and developed a strategy based on that. I would say you should do the same. Whether you decide to work with an agent or use direct mail or bandit signs or whatever, it is important to develop a clear plan of action (write it down), have 2 or 3 means of finding motivated sellers, and to execute consistently and persistently.
One dollar so you can use that dollar for the option money on an assignable option contract. I picked up my first condo for a dollar and negotiated the short sale and flipped it.
Kelle711,
How many hours per week do you put into your business ? I was looking to put in 10 to 15 per week because I work another job but want to transition to wholesaling FT in the future.
I think 10-15 hours a week sounds like a great start. That is where I started. I used that time to mail about 200 letters each week, call back the 8 - 12 sellers who would call, attend rei meetings to build my buyers list, post craigslist ads, research properties, prepare and send offers, etc.
I think the real question is how much time do you need to put in to get what you want, out. That number of hours is different for everyone depending on how effectively you are using your time, what systems you are utilizing, how effective your marketing is, etc. The only real way to know is to start doing it, evaluate your results and adjust until you are getting the results you want.
I hope this helps.
I got started with a $200 E-bay REI education and $200 in Bandit Signs.
If you get out there and start doing it, you’ll get far enough along so you can reach out to a Mentor that will help you because you actually did something to develop a deal.
Good Luck. Dave
Hey Kelle how do you go about getting your list of absentee owners and sending direct mail to them?
Not very much at all. You might want to ask yourself, how much you are willing to spend as budget for marketing leads. But the Wholesaling process itself, you will need an earnest money deposit, anywhere between $10-$100 will do. You will want to make it as less an amount as possible, just in case the contract with the seller gets canceled and the amount gets forfeited or if you can’t take it back.
I did my first wholesale deal with a $10 earnest fee. I advertised for bird dogs on Craig’s List for Free. One bird dog found a vacant boarded up junker. It had to go thru Probate but we made $7,750 each.
My next one I got from hand writing yellow letters to absentee owners. That’s expensive, but it can be profitable. If your motivated but have no funds, start with recruiting bird dogs and placing ads in CL. After ur first few deals then u can delegate more funds in locating distressed sellers.
You can either drive for dollars for your first deal or make as many cheap signs as you can and post them in areas that you have your buyers list. Don’t have one, you need to get one, the faster you get one the faster you can take action on areas/homes that they want, the faster you can make some ends. :bobble
There’s no certain amount. But what I’m certain about is that if you want to get started at Real Estate Investing with very little money, then Wholesaling is the best way to go. What you can do is invest in getting well-informed first. You can take advantage of all the free stuff offered by different sites and forums like REIClub. Get interactive and learned from those who are doing it, just like what you are doing now. :smile